


Epilogue (Emergency Light)

by airdeari



Series: self-indulgent aoilight within [2]
Category: Zero Escape (Video Games)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-07
Updated: 2016-09-07
Packaged: 2018-08-13 15:14:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7981198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/airdeari/pseuds/airdeari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A little drabbling as a conclusion to Emergency Light because I was pleasantly surprised and inspired by the amount of love I got for it. What happens to our boys after their adventure? Do they live happily ever after?? Do they keep making stupid dick jokes??? (yes)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Epilogue (Emergency Light)

“You’re different now, Aoi.”

The past few weeks had been a gentle whirlwind of change. When Aoi went left the hospital in a sling with seventeen stitches in his left arm, he did not go home to his apartment. Everyone made a pretense of worrying about him living alone with only one good arm, and that was how he found himself going home with the Fields. They had a fold-out couch that Aoi fell asleep on before it was unfolded.

Aoi was at first surprised by the neatness of the Fields’ residence, with nary an object out of place, until Light tripped over his suitcase. Soon the act of misplacing something left something nagging in the back of Aoi’s head until he put it back—like opening a parenthesis and knowing you have not yet closed it, Light had suggested, but Aoi did not open parentheses often enough to appreciate the comparison. He liked the way a tidy apartment made him feel.

Clover complained about being the third wheel in the household for a little while, mostly in jest. Aoi, too, thought it was silly that he was staying at the Fields’ when Akane had all but vacated the Kurashikis’ loft in favor of her fiancé’s place. Although he was sure it was a lovely residence, Light turned down Aoi’s offer for the convenience of knowing his surroundings. When it became clear that Aoi was not returning any time soon, Akane and Junpei migrated to the lovely apartment going tragically underused.

Aoi grew on Clover quickly, first with the stir fry he whipped together from the odds and ends in their fridge, then with the centipede he killed in her room. It had not yet been a year since she and Light had moved out, but the worst part, according to her, was dealing with the bugs on her own. Even if he wanted to help, Light was incapable of vanquishing the insects that Clover shrieked at. She surprised Aoi with a quick hug of gratitude as he folded the deceased critter into a tissue. Perhaps it was not the hug itself that surprised him, but how much he found himself liking the idea of being part of her family.

And Clover was not often in the apartment, anyway, Aoi found out. First she called it a girls’ night out, then a slumber party, then she stopped making excuses when she stayed the night at Alice’s. It was on the second or third of those nights that Light officially invited Aoi to sleep in his room. Aoi had accidentally fallen asleep on Light’s bed once before—Light had made a mythological reference that Aoi did not catch and therefore found it necessary to recount the complicated story in too gentle a voice for Aoi to keep his eyes open—so the gesture was only a formality. Between them were only three arms, one fewer than usual to worry about crushing in the middle of the night. Aoi had never liked sleeping on his side until he did it with Light at his back, an arm around his waist, lips in his hair.

Being blind, Light had no problem walking into the bathroom to brush his teeth and take medicine while someone was showering. Aoi was quite flustered the first time it happened, even though they had already been through this song and dance when Light invited him to change into pajamas while they were both in the room.

Aoi had been wary when he eyed the harp in the corner of the living room. He had heard Light play before and knew he was talented, but no one liked that roommate or neighbor who practiced at the worst possible times. What separated Light from the apocryphal roommate was not just talent, nor was it his habit of playing mostly in the evenings while Aoi was preparing dinner. He did not practice so much as he just played. He never ran through scales, nor did he repeat passages ad infinitum, because his music was not about technicality, but about the mood he created. The notes came easily from his fingers as soon as he pulled them from his head. After just a few minutes of tuning, he played pure music.

This life had started to feel like the new normal, perhaps a better normal than Aoi had known before. So when Light told him he had changed, he did not know how.

“No, perhaps you haven’t changed,” Light mused. “Perhaps I’m just seeing a different side of you now.”

“Pretty sure I’m being as big an asshole to you as everybody else.”

“Ah, but see, you did not use to be this way around me,” Light said with a wry smile, a finger to his lips. “I choose to interpret it as a token of your affection.”

There was no distinct point when the switch had occurred, but over time, Aoi had stopped getting flustered by Light’s often flirtatious teasing. He felt at ease with Light, and when he was at ease, the comebacks flew out one after another. They kept the pace of their conversation fast. Though they were never affectionate in public, the rhythm of their banter gave them away when old friends came by to visit. Even Junpei, who so naïvely believed Aoi was staying with the Fields solely because of his injury, picked up on their vibes during a dinner at the Kurashiki apartment. Aoi and Light had bet against Clover that Junpei would not suspect a thing over the course of the evening. The price to pay was a night at a fancy restaurant—making not a dent in the wallet of the successful stock broker—so, in a way, everybody won.

 “Can I ask you something very self-indulgent?” Light said. “Forgive my curiosity, but how long have you had feelings for me?”

“Y’know, on and off about a decade,” replied Aoi nonchalantly. “I’m a sentimental bastard, so shoot me.”

“No, that’s perfectly valid. I often thought I would never be able to coexist with anyone who did not understand my… unique experiences,” said Light. “The connection to the morphic fieldset, the Nonary Game… the _other_ Nonary Game…”

“Wasn’t my idea, I told you.”

“The Nazis also claimed they were ‘just following orders’, Aoi.”

“Hey, what’s this Godwin’s Law shit? You’re better than that, Light.”

“But we both know I have no real intention of finding fault with your actions.”

The hardest thing for Aoi to get used to was the fact that Light was never angry. In his experience, even the most compatible of couples found little things to fight about now and then, when one of them was having a bad day and the other one left the milk out by accident. Light, however, had an uncomfortably perfect control over his outwardly emotions. When Aoi yelled about the milk, Light apologized and even offered to walk to the convenience store to replace it, and when that was not enough to calm Aoi down, he called Aoi out on his mood—as sour as the milk, he could not help but joke—and focused on what could be done to lift it. And then Aoi would find himself wrapped in a blanket with a mug of honey chamomile tea in the privacy of Light’s empty bedroom while the gentle sound of Light busying himself with his harp seeped in under the doorway. And Aoi learned to yell less, and speak more, the way Light did on those rare occasions he had a bother on his mind. “I might be irritable because I’m worried about Clover’s mission this weekend,” he might calmly say, or, “I’m a bit tired from the concert and would prefer some quiet, if that’s alright.” Aoi’s warnings were coarser, along the lines of, “My three biggest stocks fucking tanked outta nowhere and half my clients are callin’ me ‘cuz they don’t get jack shit about how the market works and I fuckin’ _hate_ people right now,” but it was better than crying over spilled milk, as the saying goes.

“So you found yourself a morphogenetic murder-game boyfriend. With a fucked-up left arm, even,” Aoi said. “He’s not blind, though. He’s missing the blind part.”

“Imagine what a mess we would be if we were both blind, you absolute fool.”

“A hot mess.”

“We wouldn’t know it.”

“ _Fuck._ Yeah, fuck that. Somebody’s gotta know how hot we are.”

As much as they joked and teased each other in increasingly provocative ways, it was some time before they knew each other more intimately. Some combination of recovery from his gunshot wound—the painkillers were dangerously good—and the stress of living in a new location made Aoi too tired to do anything more than juggle stocks, cook a few meals, and track down terrorists. As with all matters, Light was patient. A little while after Aoi’s stitches came out, the young men fell into each other’s arms, flesh against flesh, and gave themselves to each other. Light coaxed out the vocalizations Aoi had trained himself to bite back and followed those cues to a trembling climax. He liked the guidance of sound, and he especially liked how chatty Aoi was when taking the lead. Aoi wondered if Light knew how much his face twisted and writhed with pleasure at the right touch.

The first time, Light had kept his left arm attached. As they huddled together for warmth under the sheets, too exhausted to retrieve their clothes, Aoi asked whether he really preferred it on or off. The second time, Light removed his prosthetic along with his clothes. He seemed more relaxed, but perhaps that was only because they had already been together once before.

“I’ll also admit I’ve been fond of you since our first meeting.”

Aoi’s lips twitched into a smile. He nudged his head against Light’s shoulder. “What for? I was a little brat back then.”

“A brat, indeed, which is why I was surprised you were so kind.”

“When the hell was I kind?”

“When you volunteered to stay behind while the other children went through the number nine door.”

“That was just logic. I was one o’ the smartest kids there, so if anybody was gonna stay behind, it had to be me.” He jabbed Light gently in the side. “ _You_ , on the other hand, with your fuckin’ fake hand, you coulda up and left through the door with them. I need an answer for that.”

“Because I was—if you’ll pardon the arrogance— _the_ smartest kid, by virtue of age if nothing else. I thought that you and Nona would stand a better chance if I were there to help you.”

“See, that’s not logic. There’s a point where you’re fuckin’ yourself over too much and it just turns into dumb kindness, and you crossed it when you did that.” Aoi reached his hand across Light’s lap to thread his fingers with Light’s. “And when you came back with me and Seven to look for my sister.”

Light rubbed his thumb up and down the back of Aoi’s hand. “By that point, I considered you a close friend.”

Aoi nodded against Light’s shoulder. “Thanks.”

“Do you also… remember it both ways?” Light asked softly.

Aoi nodded again. Light held Aoi as he had ten years ago, almost. Both of them remembered it even though they should not have.

They remembered a lot of things that had never happened. They woke each other in the night with the cold sweat of a phantom memory crawling down their skin. It was so good to have someone who understood, who almost remembered it too, who could tell them what had really happened and where they were and kiss them and hold them until they fell back to sleep.

Clover had the same fits on the nights she slept alone in her bedroom. When it was bad enough, she poked her head into her brother’s room, her eyes brimming with tears. She never felt more like a sister to Aoi than the night he had woken before Light to her late night intrusion and held her while she whispered things she was too afraid to tell her brother, but that Aoi already knew, about the sins she had committed when she took the axe from the captain’s quarters.

“I-I was so s- _scared_ , I—”

“I know, Clover. It’s okay.”

“Aoi, I—I ki—I ki—”

“You didn’t. It didn’t really happen. It’s okay. Everyone’s okay.”

“Y-y-you and Seven—and _June_ , and—”

He held her head under his chin. He wanted to kiss her hair in the way he kissed Akane on nights like these.

“I forgive you,” he said. “Anybody doesn’t forgive you, doesn’t have someone they love like you love your brother. I know what that’s like. I forgive you.”

He did not remember falling asleep, but the three woke up in a comfortable tangle on Light’s bed that morning, the long shape of the window spreading across the sheets in the glow of sunrise.

“I don’t know why I didn’t expect things to escalate like this,” Light said after Clover had trudged groggily back to her own room. “Somehow I thought this would be nothing more than a little fling, even though we’ve both liked each other since we were teenagers.”

“Don’t go where it sounds like you’re goin’ with this.”

“Heavens, no. Who do you think I am, Junpei?”

As Aoi barked with laughter, Light landed a haphazard kiss along his jawline, the kind of kiss that he gave when he did not bother to reach for Aoi’s face with a hand to get his bearings first.

“Also, with your income,” said Light with a wry grin, “I would expect _you_ to buy the ring.”

“Cheapskate. You’d probably weave me some piece of shit out of flowers. ‘It means eternal love and it was really hard to find the right plants ‘cuz I’m fuckin’ _blind_ , Aoi.’”

Light’s bouts of genuine laughter were as hard to come by as Aoi’s, and just as delightful. They laughed more with each other than they ever had before.

**Author's Note:**

> no seriously guys im so happy you liked my aoilight fic. as much fun as it was to write, it cannot compare to the exhilaration i felt upon reading your enthused responses to it (and having responses show up in my tumblr asks??? like lmao hi guys I can't believe you put your eyeballs on my shit blog to tell me you liked my writing. that gets me every time. i love you.)
> 
> i hope everyone had a good time with the boys. its been a lot of fun. thanks for reading. :)


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